WEB EVANGELISM BULLETIN
. . . learning from each other
W-E-B Issue 177 ~ Jan-Feb 2010
Monthly ISSN 471-0323
News this time...
ENGAGING WITH ALTERNATIVE SPIRITUALITY FOLLOWERS
DAVE WANTS FEEDBACK ON WEB MINISTRY AND COLLEGE NEEDS
MEETINGS AND CONFERENCES
WORLD WE LIVE IN
BOOK REVIEWS
DIGITAL EVANGELISM ISSUES BLOG - GET FREE BOOK
HOW TO PROMOTE YOUR OWN BLOG
IE DAY IN SINGAPORE
EFFECTIVE COMMUNICATION
FREE OUTREACH LITERATURE FOR AFRICA AND ASIA
TECH TIPS
MOBILE ACCESS IN AFRICA AND ASIA
SOCIAL MEDIA
TAILEND
"Computers are incredibly fast, accurate and stupid; humans are incredibly slow,
inaccurate and brilliant; together they are powerful beyond imagination" - source unknown
ENGAGING WITH ALTERNATIVE SPIRITUALITY FOLLOWERS
Joanna Quintrell brings the Christ alternative to alternative spirituality seekers. In this challenging CT article, staff writer Tim Stafford tells the story of a remarkable center that engages with people of various New Age beliefs. This is such an important issue. The default religious position for many people in the West is a New Age/semi-Buddhist worldview. It is probably effectively the majority viewpoint in many countries, although as with any religious viewpoint, the percentage of serious practitioners is much smaller. I certainly know many people who would likely relate well to the type of ministry Quintrell is using, and yet would be repelled by traditional church, or find it irrelevant.
The world desperately needs more Christians to use the insights that Joanna has gained.
There are also surely many opportunities to engage with alternative spirituality seekers
through websites that take a comparable contextualized approach:
http://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2009/december/31.40.html
DAVE WANTS FEEDBACK ON WEB MINISTRY AND COLLEGE NEEDS
Dr. David Bourgeois at Biola University has researching and teaching the use of the
Internet for ministry and evangelism for several years. This year, he is focused on
writing a book in this area and is looking for feedback on some of the topics he will be
covering. He is also putting together an online course on web ministry for the summer. He
will be blogging about his work in preparing the book and the course and would love to
interact with those who are out there "in the field". I encourage you to interact with
Dave and let him know what you are doing. You can get details on his work by reading his
first blog post of the year. This posting also includes links for you to sign up to
receive his postings via email or RSS:
http://genesys11.com/lessonsfrombabel/2010/01/08/kicking-off-2010/
You can also access postings (and become a fan) via his Facebook fan page:
http://www.facebook.com/pages/Lessons-From-Babel/268099038825
If you belong to a college faculty, or are a student, looking for a ready-made distance
learning module on web ministry, please also help Dave by completing a brief
questionnaire:
http://genesys11.com/lessonsfrombabel/internet-ministry-online-education/
MEETINGS AND CONFERENCES
VILNIUS: Day Conference on web evangelism in Vilnius, Lithuania, March 27. I'll be speaking. Write for details.
MISE 2010 - Mission Igniter conference, Poulsbo WA, March 17:
- practical tips on using technology to advance mission
- creative strategies to build community on- and off-line
- keynote speaker Jesse Rice (author: Church of Facebook)
http://www.MISE2010.com/
ICCM EUROPE CONFERENCE - March 10-13 Netherlands:
http://www.iccm-europe.org/index.php?n=EU2010.Home
NRB CONFERENCE HASNVILLE Feb 27 - March 2
I just heard from John Carley, Internet Chairman for National Religious Broadcasters, and
he can get a free $300 comp pass to attend the annual National Religious Broadcasters
Convention in Nashville Tennesee At the event they even created a second track of Internet
Sessions this year specifically on Internet Evangelism. He gave me permission to send it
out to all Internet Evangelism attendees and offer this free pass. Only requirement is
that you have never attended a NRB before. Flights are good priced now, around $200-300
and there are hotels in the area from $69-$186 at the hotel per night. Usually about 5,000
people who attend it's a great event with Keynotes from Tony Evans, Kay Arthur, Chuck
Colson, and tons of networking/brainstorming and educational sessions about Internet. If
you are interested, email me and I can get you the comp pass to fill out and send into
NRB.
http://www.nrbconvention.org/
UK MEDIA: Free 3-day training course for young aspiring media professionals in UK, June
2010:
http://www.churchesmediacouncil.org.uk/conference/academy/
CHURCH website seminars around UK from a site provider group:
http://www.churchwebsitetips.co.uk/
NEED A SPEAKER for a conference. We have a panel of international speakers:
http://www.internetevangelismday.com/speaker.php
WHY CONFERENCES NEED TO CHANGE - Kelly Dolan pleads for new approaches:
http://iblogo.com/2010/02/02/events-need-to-change-here-are-some-ideas/
WORLD WE LIVE IN
AVATAR AND THE MOVIE BLUES - lack of a real Pandora leaves some people sad:
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/life_and_style/health/mental_health/article6992862.ece
LORD OF THE RINGS PREQUEL. British actress and film-maker Kate Madison has made a
low-budget (£25,000/$39,000) story about Aragorn: BORN OF HOPE. And it is getting
rave reviews - London Times gave it four stars:
http://entertainment.timesonline.co.uk/tol/arts_and_entertainment/film/article7022550.ece
And you can watch it online free:
http://www.bornofhope.com/
THE FAULT LINE IN HAITI RUNS BACK TO EUROPE - The Haitian tragedy runs back a long way.
As a French slave colony, it was run in ways that were beyond appalling even by the
standards of the time. It shockingly required 'imports' of 50,000 new slaves every year to
replace those who had died during the year. And after independence, very high
'reparations' mandated by France kept the country in permanent debt and poverty for a
century and half:
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/columnists/ben_macintyre/article6995750.ece
BOOK REVIEWS
I Hate Witnessing
Dick Innes
ISBN 0-9642525-0-3
Acts Communications
Many will know of Dick through his email devotional Daily Encounter. His 'I Hate
Witnessing' book has just been republished with a whole new section on the potential of
the Web for sharing your faith. For review, sample chapters, and where to buy this
valuable communication handbook:
http://www.internetevangelismday.com/bookreviews/i-hate-witnessing.php
GET IT FREE - first website to syndicate our blog posts into their own site or blog (as explained in next item) will receive a copy.
Discerning Reader book review site is featuring:
The Trellis and the Vine
The Ministry Mind-Shift That Changes Everything
Colin Marshall, Tony J. Payne
Matthias Media (2009)
http://www.discerningreader.com/book-reviews/the-trellis-and-the-vine
DIGITAL EVANGELISM ISSUES BLOG - GET FREE BOOK
Please consider adding a summary of our blog headlines on your site. It is very easy,
just grab the code here:
http://www.internetevangelismday.com/feedburner
For a website, choose 'other' to get the HTML code. When people click on a link, it will open in a new tab or window. You can also select options to add to MySpace, Yahoo Mail and other options. We will create an honor roll page of sites who do this, which will give you added search engine ranking. First site to do this during February will get a free copy of Dick Innes' book I HATE WITNESSING. Just email www.internetevangelismday.com/feedback as soon as you have installed it, along with your postal address.
SYNDICATION: If you have a Facebook account and would like to syndicate Digital Evangelism Issues postings within your Facebook page, here's what to do:
1. Sign in to Facebook
2. Open a new tab, and visit http://networkedblogs.com/blog/digital_evangelism_issues/ and click the 'follow' button
3. In Facebook, on every page, you will notice a tab marked + in the line of tabs that
start with 'Wall'.
4. Click on this + tab and choose 'blogs', then choose 'Digital Evangelism Issues'
5. Our blog will be displayed under 'blogs I follow'
FACEBOOK FAN PAGE: please also consider adding our fan page to your Facebook page. It
takes about 2 seconds: click on this link, then select the 'Become a fan' link at the top
of that page:
http://www.facebook.com/internetevangelismday
HOW TO PROMOTE YOUR OWN BLOG
1. Get a Facebook account (if you do not have one), then register your blog at
Facebook's Networked Blogs page. You can then set up Networked Blogs and Facebook so that
each of your blog postings will appear on your wall (and potentially on friend's sites
too). You can then encourage other Facebook users to share your blog posts. See how we
have suggested people do this for our blog at:
http://www.internetevangelismday.com/dec-to-facebook.php
2. Set up a PostRank.com profile, then 'claim' and 'verify' your blog
3. Submit your blog to http://church.alltop.com/ if it is definitive and established within its subject area
4. Use Google's webmaster tools to ensure that Google will spider and list your blog instantly every time there is a new post
5. Google to find blog directories (Christian and secular), and submit to some. They
may not send you many visitors directly, but incoming links will increase your page rank.
Those worth considering include:
www.blogcatalog.com | www.blogtopsites.com | www.ontoplist.com/blog-directory | www.technorati.com
6. Ensure that there is a one-click option under each post, for readers to send a summary of it to Facebook, Twitter and other social networking options
7. Ensure that your blog homepage and each individual posting have meaningful and unique title tags and meta descriptions in the page header, not just a generic automated short summary based on the page h1 tag and blog name.
8. Create a Facebook Fan Page for your blog. Then invite your Facebook friends to
become fans. Use NetworkedBlogs to publish your blog postings to the Fan Page
automatically. You need to have a normal Facebook page first. Log in, then go to
http://www.facebook.com/pages/create.php
Be careful how you choose to classify it. You will probably fit under 'brand product or
organization' but then choose an item from the drop-down list, rather than leaving it at
the default. Add a permanent link from your blog about it. When you have 25+ fans, you can
go to
http://www.facebook.com/username
to choose a shortened username for the fan page.
9. Help people receive blog posts via the route they want. Some want email postings, which you can set up via Feedburner. Others want it via Twitter - here's how. Join Twitter, then use one of several services such as twitterfeed.com which will automatically send each new blog post out through Twitter
10. If you subscribe to blog feeds in Google Reader, you can then select specific blog
postings to become public. Essentially, what you are making is a 'best of' blog of your
own, that others can subscribe to directly. By adding your own blog postings or others you
find valuable, you are creating an added-value public resource that can draw in visitors
to all the blogs you have chosen. Dave Bourgeois is doing it here:
http://www.google.com/reader/shared/DBinBrea
IE DAY IN SINGAPORE
As they did last year, Christians in Singapore will be advocating online evangelism to
the wider church:
http://www.facebook.com/inbox/?tid=1222603204018#/group.php?gid=57799608602
If you have specific plans for your town or area, please let us know. How to plan an IE
Day:
http://www.internetevangelismday.com/planning.php
Please use our latest news release:
http://www.internetevangelismday.com/latestnews (Word file)
EFFECTIVE COMMUNICATION
MURDER this word, says Brian Jones:
http://www.brianjones.com/2010/01/committing-murder/
THE NEW E in Evangelism - Engagement: Brian Barela writes in his blog about the rapidly
changing needs for online evangelism: "The new evangelistic landscape will be engagement.
At some point the exposure bubble will finally burst and a whole new set of tools,
presentations, and success criteria will emerge. There have been glimpses of this trend
already: Soularium developed by CCC and The Four Circles by Intervarsity. Both uniquely
emphasize engagement over exposure."
http://brianbarela.typepad.com/the_necessary_things/2010/01/the-new-e-in-evangelismengagement.html
RELATIONSHIPS are key:
http://mylordandmyblog.wordpress.com/2009/10/26/importance-of-relationships-as-tool-for-evangelism
THE MONKEY AND THE FISH parable is a challenge to any sort of evangelism, especially in
a cross-cultural setting:
http://worshipandthearts.blogspot.com/2010/02/reaching-japanese-for-christ-through.html
MAKING HOLES, NOT DRILLS explains how lateral thinking can be vital in ministry and
also looks at the need to use visual story in evangelism:
http://www.internetevangelismday.com/blog/archives/1341
THE SECRET OF THRIVING ORGANIZATIONS IS... goals and freedom, says Modern Ekklesia:
http://www.modernekklesia.com/2010/01/secret-of-thriving-organizations.html
LESSONS FROM APOLLO 13 - Do you produce better under pressure? Are you more creative
with a deadline?
http://rexmiller.net/general/3-secrets-to-innovation-from-apollo-13/
ALTAR CALLS - yes, no or how?
http://baptist-rp.blogspot.com/2009/12/for-or-against-altar-call-and-sinners.html
COMMON MISTAKES church planters make:
http://www.gregatkinson.com/2010/01/26/most-common-mistakes-church-planters-make/
CONVERSATION STARTERS - here are video clips ideal to start spiritual conversations.
Check out the compelling and chilling animation 'Alma' from Pixar designer Rodrigo Blaas,
and clips available from the Global Short Film Network:
http://www.internetevangelismday.com/blog/archives/1230
ASIAN POLITENESS - can be a stumbling block in evangelism:
http://www.abigmission.com/asian-politeness-and-evangelism.html
FREE OUTREACH LITERATURE FOR AFRICA AND ASIA
SOON Ministries' free single-sheet outreach papers in easy-English and African French
are now printed in full color. View samples:
www.web-evangelism.com/pdf/soon203.pdf
www.web-evangelism.com/pdf/bientot231.pdf
Other papers are available as two-color sheets, in Swahili, African Portuguese and
Fulani. To request copies, visit:
www.internetevangelismday.com/feedback
TECH TIPS
- non-techies look away from screen now
FLASH COOKIES are not the same as normal cookies:
http://www.macromedia.com/support/documentation/en/flashplayer/help/settings_manager.html
VALIDATION FIELDS IN FORMS can create problems:
http://www.devwebpro.com/is-adding-more-validation-fields-in-your-forms-killing-your-conversation/
GETTING PASSWORDS BACK in Gmail and Hotmail:
http://iforgotmypassword.net/
CSS FOR DIV SCROLLBARS - with javascript:
http://www.webreference.com/authoring/style/sheets/custom-scrollbar/
CHRISTIAN WEBMASTER RESOURCE - Erica Mattingly has various resources to use or
download:
http://www.christian-code-city.com/
DEFRAG - free tools that are better than the built-in Windows defragger:
http://blogs.techrepublic.com.com/products/?p=978&tag=leftCol;post-1485
GOOGLE DOCS now a storage device for any sort of file - backup or save stuff you
need:
http://www.researchbuzz.org/wp/google-turns-google-docs-into-a-storage-device/
GOOGLE WAVE is still new, but this collaborative tool seems full of promise:
http://brianbarela.typepad.com/the_necessary_things/2009/12/one-way-to-use-google-wave-when-leading-a-team-meeting.html
AVIARY.COM online photo editing is now free, as Mr Nifty blogs (follow this blog for
many such useful tips):
http://misternifty.com/creative/graphics/intensely-free-editing-suite/
MOBILE ACCESS IN AFRICA AND ASIA
The growth of mobiles in Africa and Asia is quite remarkable. Learn more about the
potential for real evangelism using mobile phones:
http://www.internetevangelismday.com/blog/archives/1314
SOCIAL MEDIA
Dr Bex Lewis has produced a valuable overview of social networking, and we offer a
range of other very useful resources for understanding and using social networking:
http://www.internetevangelismday.com/blog/archives/1276
Notable developments in social media during 2009:
http://www.webpronews.com/topnews/2009/12/22/the-year-in-social-media-2009
10 Web trends to watch in 2010 Pete Cashmore is founder and CEO of Mashable, a popular
blog about social media:
http://www.cnn.com/2009/TECH/12/03/cashmore.web.trends.2010/
The Gen Y Guide to Web 2.0 at Work:
http://brianbarela.typepad.com/the_necessary_things/2009/12/geny-in-ministry.html
10 must-read books on social media, including three free downloads:
http://mashable.com/2009/12/21/must-read-ebooks/
Gmail's new BUZZ service is something between Twitter and Facebook in scope. Do we need
yet another stream of consciousness? Use Google blog search to see comments and reviews on
this new innovation:
http://blogsearch.google.com/
Facebook in 15 minutes a day: if you are in ministry, lack time, maybe do not
understand or enjoy Facebook too well, here's some useful advice:
http://brianbarela.typepad.com/the_necessary_things/2010/02/how-to-maximize-your-time-on-facebook-for-those-in-ministry.html
Reasons to have a Facebook page, and ways to make it better:
http://www.webpronews.com/topnews/2010/02/08/reasons-to-have-a-facebook-page-and-ways-to-make-it-better
TAILEND ô¿ô
By the time Ted arrived at the football game, the first quarter was almost over. "Why are you so late?" his friend asked.
"I had to toss a coin to decide between going to church and coming to the game."
"How long could that have taken you?"
"Well, I had to toss it 14 times."
[source: www.mikeysFunnies.com ]
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